The tires used by most land based vehicles may occasionally experience issues such as leaks or even complete depressurizations. Such issues may arise, for example, as a result of tire misuse such as overloading, failure to inspect, failure to maintain recommended air pressure, failure to rotate and/or retread at recommended intervals, etc. Due to such types of misuse, the overall condition of a tire may therefore change over time.
As with many other components of a vehicle, accumulated mileage, e.g., as measured using a vehicle odometer, is often used to determine when to inspect and/or perform maintenance activities on a tire. In many instances, the inspection and maintenance activities are primarily directed towards addressing tread wear, as the tread depth of a tire decreases with usage, and proper maintenance activities such as rotating tires and setting proper vehicle alignment can often reduce the rate and increase the uniformity of tread wear, thereby extending the length of time a tire can be used before a recommended minimum tread depth is reached.
Furthermore, while tread wear is one factor associated with the overall condition of a tire, it is not the sole factor, so in many cases, the condition of a tire is not solely based on accumulated mileage and/or the current tread depth for the tire. Rather, the condition of a tire may be considered in some instances to based upon both the condition of the tire treads and the condition of the tire casing, so additional factors such as ambient temperature, cavity temperature, tire pressure, vehicle load, tire position (i.e., where the tire is on a vehicle), frequency of rotation and other tire maintenance, and driving style can have a significant impact on the overall condition of a tire. As a result, one tire of a particular model that is on a vehicle that is lightly loaded and run in a temperate climate, and that is routinely rotated and maintained at a recommended tire pressure, may have a different overall condition than another tire of the same model that has the same accumulated mileage, but that is used on a vehicle that is heavily loaded, run on poor roads in a tropical environment, and rarely if ever rotated and pressurized to the recommended tire pressure.
A need therefore exists in the art for an improved manner of assessing the condition of a tire based on the actual operating conditions to which the tire is exposed.